Hi everyone, and welcome back to this my "web space" about my adventures in Valencia. First of all I'd like to apologize for my lack of posting lately, and I won't say it's because of "time" issues. Actually "lack of time" excuses are pretty common and everyone just says "sorry I couldn't write you, I was quite busy" but as a matter of fact is not about the lack of time but the lack of time management. There's always time to write some lines or make a call... the difference here is that sometimes we just don't take those few minutes to do so... anyway, my sincerest apologies for this.
On the other hand I decided to start posting in English in order to make this blog a little bit more international. It's not that I don't like writing in Spanish (I even prefer it) but it's nice for non-Spanish speaking people to be able to read what I got to say. And in order to be fair, I got inspired from my good friend Alberto Barcia, who's doing practically the same thing... good one friend... keep it up!!
Anyway, the main reason why I wasn't able to post is quite good and therefore I'm sure you'll forgive and understand me whatsoever: During the last three weeks me and my EPS team were finishing our project and getting ready for the final presentation... Two things easily said, but believe me when I say they are far, far more complicated.
However, before going any further, an explanation of what our project is about is required, isn't it? Well for a start, our project title is "Design of a 3D Warehouse Simulation/Mock-Up Integrated in a Warehouse Management Structure" (from now on referred as WMS and Mock-up) and as it's name implies, we were in charge of developing an extension to an already in development warehouse management software. This extension consisted on a graphical and physical simulation of a warehouse which could help the user of the software on visualizing better the modifications made on the WMS system. In other words put a face and a body to a computer software.
Basically there were 5 tasks:
a) WMS background research
b) 3D Modeling
c) Automation
d) Software programming
e) Product image
The stage I was in charge of was the Automation stage, in which the objective was to acquire a little warehouse model and automate it by installing and programming a PLC (Programmable Logic Controller) so it could be connected to the software and receive orders from it. The IDF Institute (the lab we were developing the project for) decided to purchase a "High Level Storage Model" from Staudinger GmbH (a German company specialized on automated equipment such as conveyors, racks, etc.)
This little puppy consists pretty much on a rack (10x5 levels) with a moving feeding device which loads and unloads pallets from or to the rack. Includes also two stations in which pallets are put on hold from somewhere else on the system for pick-up/receive from/to the feeder unit.
The good thing about this is that this model was already configured for automation, so no further wiring or motor installation was required. How ever, it was my duty to make it suitable for a PLC connection before anything else. The PLC unit the IDF provided us was an OMRON CMJ1 with enough input/output modules for the signals of the model. So wire by wire the model got connected to the PLC.
Then the next step was basically generate software routines for the PLC for movements and operation. In other words, teaching the brain (PLC) which muscles (motors, switches) had to be moved according certain instructions (commands from software). For that the technique I used was Grafcet diagrams which pretty much are a version of a flow chart specialized on automation from where programming lines come up pretty much automatically.
Once accomplished some how this task, the next step was to connect it to the software my good friend Martin Michalik developed for "commanding" the model. Pretty much his task was to generate a visual interface in which user could send commands to the model, kind of like a "translator" between model-PLC-software-user, for an easier idea. And this is when things got to hell... literally.
Since our model arrived quite late (3 weeks before deadline) the preliminary work had to be done at a fast step leaving us only one week (or less) to accomplish software-hardware integration, and therefore when encountering errors on sequences and programming lines we didn't have enough time to perform proper debugging. Long story short, we spent pretty much a whole week living in the lab, programming, cursing and breaking some model parts and also preparing a final report and presentation of the project to the EPS tutors and colleagues. Thank the Lord my other team members also did some work, like Clarissa and her research, Sandra with her 3D view of our model and the great Jelena, who managed to come up with a cool web page and some media as for the product image.
Actually the very last night before presentation Martin and I didn't sleep trying to get our "baby" ready to perform a "on-line demonstration" of its capability. The objective was to command our software from the presentation's room and broadcasting via webcam in the laboratory the movements of the model back to the room for a "live show". However we could pull that off due to time constrains and a server which refused to operate properly. Nevertheless, we already had some videos already prepared for this "eventuality".
At the end we came up with a pretty good final presentation, showing the web page and our videos along with a straight-forward-presentation and receive pretty darn acceptable feedback. As an overall I could say the team, tutors and fellow EPS colleagues were pretty satisfied with the conclusion of each other's work and satisfied by it's outcomes.
After everyone's presentation I don't have to say that we went straight away to grab some beers and celebrate the completion of our European Project Semester.
Long live EPS!
See ya later
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